Wildwood Dress

You sick of my mug yet?  No help for it, I suppose.

I've been thinking a lot about about what sorts of silhouettes appeal to me, and what kinds of things suit my figure and basic style (as well as my stage of life).  I still think that my basic Frankenpattern dress is a good fit for me, but I'm experimenting with some other things too right now.

But sometimes, you just want to make a quick and easy project.  I was sort of looking to create another Tokyo Train Ride type dress--very straight forward, no frills, a basic up and down dress.  I really love that dress and feel pretty good in it every time I wear it.

I've had my eye on this fabric for several months, and decided that this dress would be a good straight up and down project.  I've been doing a lot of handwork on my June Historical Sew Monthly project, and I thought it would be nice to have something quick and easy.

I call this: Fantastically Weird Things to do with your hands while taking photos.

As it turns out, I ended up finishing all the edges on this dress by hand.  I used some coordinating bias tape that I had in my stash, but it was 7/8" wide, and I usually use 1/2" to finish the edges and then machine stitch it all down.  For whatever reason, that bias did not want to lie flat around the neckline.  I don't know if it was the shape (I cut a sort of U-shape) or the width of the bias or what, but I could tell I wasn't going to be able to machine stitch it down.  And I didn't want to hand finish the neckline and then have machine stitched sleeves and hem.  So I hand hemmed the bias on the hem, sleeves, and neckline. 

I almost left the buttons off, but decided that the small busy print could use a little something.  I had some coordinating blue buttons and a small blue buckle that worked out well.

I did make a contrasting belt from some navy blue fabric that is from the same collection (Wildwood by Elizabeth Olwen for Cloud 9 fabrics) but it didn't quite look right.  I had made the self-belt first, and liked the low contrast better.  I might try it with the contrast belt sometime just for variety, though.

The second button is on a little crooked, so I'll need to reattach it, but it is okay for today.  I wasn't sure about this dress, to be honest--sometimes those quick and easy projects don't quite come out as expected, but I think it is a good dress.  The colorway suits my complexion, and I still really like the print.  The belt is a smidge tight (thank you, belly bloat), but I could fix that by making the overturn at the buckle a bit smaller.

And a good hair day!  Plus a high of 66!  I think it must be the start of a good day.

Details:

Wildwood Dress: Wildwood cotton fabric via etsy, vintage buttons from the stash (but via etsy), vintage bias via etsy and a peach zipper

Cardigan: Banana Republic

Shoes: Clarks via ebay

Earrings: hand me down from my mom